Free-Floating Thoughts and Links

Recently, I responded to some feisty comments from Robert Quinlan Costas. The fun hasn’t ended, folks! I urge my seven loyal readers (Hi, grandma!) to check out John Brattain’s takes on those comments:

Per the Philadelphia Daily News, Brett Myers thinks that the team’s dismal spring training performances are meaningless. Manager Charlie Manuel disagrees. Spring training numbers don’t correlate with regular season numbers… yada, yada, yada… this is one rare point in which I believe the numbers aren’t necessary here.

Of course Brett Myers thinks spring training games are meaningless: he has nothing to fight for in the spring. Maybe that’s why he’s been performing so well, too. However, the pitchers who are really stinking it up — Adam Eaton, Travis Blackley, J.D. Durbin, Kyle Kendrick — have little job security to fall back on. To them, spring training games should be just as meaningful as regular season games because they may not even see Major League regular season games, especially at the rate they’re going.

If Eaton and The Gang can’t put it together with a metaphorical gun to the heads of their Major League jobs, why am I to believe that they’ll somehow “flip a switch” once March 31 rolls around?

Kyle Lohse

Lohse, client of super-agent Scott Boras, rolled the dice this off-season searching for a deal in the ballpark of what Carlos Silva got: 4 years, $48 million. No one bit, but the Phillies did offer him a 3-year, $21 million contract, which was declined. Lohse went jobless all off-season, and it was eerie, since league-average pitchers like him are usually snapped up quickly and suited in cash. The Cardinals gave him a one-year deal worth $4.25 million.

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As recently as two weeks ago, Phillies assistant GM Mike Arbuckle (who, along with Ruben Amaro Jr., is a top candidate to take over for Pat Gillick when he departs after this season) said in regards to Lohse, “I know we’re not interested” even when Lohse said he’d take a one-year deal worth between $4 and $10 million. Why no interest?

The only plausible reasoning I can think of is Scott Boras. He and the Phillies have a bitter past (think J.D. Drew on draft day), and the two sides may have just been unwilling to negotiate with each other. If this explanation is actually true, then this is a colossal failure to do right by the people who keep the team in business. The front office owes it to the fans and to the players to put together the best team they can to attempt to win a World Series. Lohse, a league-average pitcher who would slot in at #5 in the Phillies rotation, gives the team a noticeably better chance at accomplishing that goal. Teams kill for a league-average pitcher at the back of the rotation, and Lohse was asking for well below market value!

Instead, the Phillies will allow the wound that is the back of the starting rotation to have the bacteria that are Eaton, Blackley, and Durbin fester. Kris Benson won’t be ready to attempt to help the Phillies until May at the earliest.

There is just no logical explanation I can think of as to why the Phillies had no interest in Lohse. There has to be something about him that not even the media knows about. Or maybe the Phillies’ front office is just incompetent.

Brackets

Just so everyone can see just what an idiot I am, I have taken screenshots of my bracket on ESPN (I have no idea if I can just send you a link to it; if so, I couldn’t find it). Remember to check back when the tournament is all done and tell me what an idiot I am. Or you can do it now, too.